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RCA Studio II GOLD MINE! An interview with the Studio 2 Production Manager!


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I have found some Hanimex MPT-02 games, in box (not in a good shape!) :

 

biorhythm

math fun

concentration match

speedway tag

space war/intercept

 

I can take photos if anybody interested to see the games. I can also scan the notice, etc.

We're definitely interested in seeing more of this- please do post images and such. You'll very likely be able to sell those to somebody here.

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Here are the photos of MPT-02 games. Language is italian so it is surprising as Trevi M-1200 is the italian version of MPT-02 clone. And, clearly, the packaging is not a Trevi one.

So, probably they are Victory games because of the design and considering the fact that Hanimex is not mention on the box.

 

Enjoy!

 

MPT-02_10.jpg
MPT-02_11.jpg
MPT-02_12.jpg
MPT-02_13.jpg
MPT-02_14.jpg
MPT-02_15.jpg
MPT-02_1.jpg
MPT-02_2.jpg
MPT-02_3.jpg
MPT-02_4.jpg
MPT-02_5.jpg
MPT-02_6.jpg
MPT-02_7.jpg
MPT-02_8.jpg
MPT-02_9.jpg

 

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I have a couple of those style games too. They are not hanimex, but probably an Italian specific variant for the soundic victory.

However I have often wondered if it's possible they could be for yet another unknown clone variation......but if so it would be 1 never recorded and I have no evidence of it. All the victory console boxes I have seen also are the same with English writing.

Edited by stupus
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Here are the photos of MPT-02 games. Language is italian so it is surprising as Trevi M-1200 is the italian version of MPT-02 clone. And, clearly, the packaging is not a Trevi one.

So, probably they are Victory games because of the design and considering the fact that Hanimex is not mention on the box.

 

Enjoy!

 

Thank you for those images- and my congratulations on adding those to your collection! If I might ask, how did you find these? Lucky Ebay auction, fellow collector, in the wild? These don't turn up often at all, particularly not with the manuals and packaging.

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Just "in the wild", bought from a person that sold these games. Some games lack of manual.

The Story of Studio II and its clones is very interesting!

 

I agree. It seems like the Studio II was the failed launch of a line of systems. Almost documentary worthy to some degree. Most definitely a book could be made out of it.

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Just "in the wild", bought from a person that sold these games. Some games lack of manual.

The Story of Studio II and its clones is very interesting!

Wait- are you in the US or overseas, if I might ask? Did you ask the seller if there were any other games? I'm really curious, as every little bit of anecdotal evidence helps fill in the blanks. There's also one game, Schoolhouse 1 (in the US), that has apparently NEVER turned up for any of the Studio III clones, and Tennis/Squash has only been seen once to my knowledge.

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I was able to extract the Arcade "Swords" game by Joe Weisbecker from the cassette tape WAV file (thanks to @ubersaurus) and wrote additional code to emulate the RCA Arcade console to run it.

Here is a screen capture of a sample game play:

 

I will put the WAV extraction program in a new Github repository when I find time to get it ready for publication. I will also update the archive at https://github.com/ajavamind/rca-studio2 for the arcade console emulation after I make some more edits .

 

Now we can see how this game worked in 1975 before Studio II.

 

Andy Modla

Edited by ajavamind
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I was able to extract the Arcade "Swords" game by Joe Weisbecker from the cassette tape WAV file (thanks to @ubersaurus) and wrote additional code to emulate the RCA Arcade console to run it.

Here is a screen capture of a sample game play:

 

I will put the WAV extraction program in a new Github repository when I find time to get it ready for publication. I will also update the archive at https://github.com/ajavamind/rca-studio2 for the arcade console emulation after I make some more edits .

 

Now we can see how this game worked in 1975 before Studio II.

 

Andy Modla

Wow, thank you Andy! I'm glad you were able to get it working, this really gives me the impetus to see about getting more of those tapes digitized from the Hagley. I'd love to see all of those tapes backed up and turned into functional game programs again.

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Oh super! Those WIP builds are pretty vital pieces of history too. I do have a bunch of other tapes digitized already in the dropbox, and I wouldn't mind trying to get those converted. How exactly do I run the wav conversion program? I downloaded the programs the readme told me to, I just haven't sorted out how to actually get it to convert the file to a binary.

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I updated the README document at https://github.com/ajavamind/rca-studio2 to show the evolution of COSMAC and how studio2 fits in. I added sections on RCA game systems preceding the Studio II.

 

I plan on expanding the README document at https://github.com/ajavamind/Extract-WAV-Data to provide more details about the COSMAC program extraction process from a WAV file.

Edited by ajavamind
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I read through the history. That's quite a few versions of the hardware!

 

Studio II Point-of-Purchase Demo says "code lost". I assume that's the demo cart dumped about a year ago. Or did you mean some sort of source code document, not just the ROM dump?

 

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/209519-rca-studio-ii-gold-mine-an-interview-with-the-studio-2-production-manager/page-42?do=findComment&comment=3677379

 

How does the Toshiba Visicom fit in? My assumption has been that Toshiba licensed the Studio II, then made their own modifications and some unique games.

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I updated the https://github.com/ajavamind/Extract-WAV-Data site with a link to video explaining how I used Audacity to help with the WAV data extraction process.

There are easier ways to use Audacity but the steps I talk about get the job done.

 

I noticed some tapes only have 2047 bytes stored, so the 2048th byte is sometimes interpreted as garbage, depending on what is trimmed from the trailing end of a program segment.

Edited by ajavamind
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Hello,


About a month ago, the eBay auction for the RCA Studio II Tester No.1 and Demo cartridges ended.


I've been in contact with the purchaser of them and have assisted in dumping both of them. The buyer wishes to remain anonymous, and I'm going to honor that wish.


Both cartridges dumped successfully. The demo cartridge dump was the same as the existing dump.


The Tester 1 dump file was tested in the Emma 02 emulator. The test cartridge identified a couple issues in the emulator, so some changes were needed to run this file correctly. Marcel has made the necessary changes to Emma 02 and plans to make a new version available soon.


I have uploaded the "Tester1" st2 file here:




I made a post a while back with a link to the RCA Studio II service manual:




The Tester 1 cartridge dump works exactly like the instructions indicate, beginning on page 4.


I am going to reflash my multicart to include these two files. I will post when I have it tested.


ED

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